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Frontiers in Energy >> 2009, Volume 3, Issue 4 doi: 10.1007/s11708-009-0069-y

Hydrogen production by biomass gasification in supercritical or subcritical water with Raney-Ni and other catalysts

1.Zhongyuan Petroleum Company Puguang Natural Gas Treating Plant, Sinopec, Dazhou 636156, China; 2.State Key Laboratory of Multiphase Flow in Power Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an 710049, China;

Available online: 2009-12-05

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Abstract

Gasification of peanut shell, sawdust and straw in supercritical or subcritical water has been studied in a batch reactor with the presence of a series of Raney-Ni and its mixture with ZnCl or Ca(OH). The main gas products were hydrogen, methane, carbon dioxide, and a small amount of carbon monoxide. Different types of Raney-Ni, containing different metal components such as Fe, Mo or Cr, have different influences on the gasification yield and hydrogen selectivity. The catalysis effect can be improved obviously by adding ZnCl or Ca(OH). Increasing the reaction temperature or adding ZnCl and Ca(OH) could improve the mass of H in gas products and reduce the mass of CH and CO at the same time. The possible mechanism is that ZnCl can decompose the biomass particle by accelerating cellulose hydrolyzation in high-temperature water, increasing more specific surface to admit catalysts, while Ca(OH) can absorb CO to produce CaCO deposit, which can drop out from the reactant system, and which will drive the reaction to get more hydrogen. With respect to the biomass conversion to gas product and selectivity of H at low temperature, the series of Raney-Ni has shown many advantages over other catalysts; thus, this kind of catalyst has great potential to be utilized in the hydrogen industry for the gasification of biomass.

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